"Has anyone thought about asking those unwashed bums on the street who sit outside city offices drunkenly shouting at people coming out of the building?

What you don't know, because you have never spoken to them, is that they once worked there as senior managers and know what they are talking about.

Thank God for the Internet that I can now shout at city types in the warm:

GERTCHA STCHAMISH RETCHID BARSTOOLS!"

"Oh, it's perfectly plausible for Bernie to be the only one who knew what was going on if he has the power of hypnosis.

I saw a professional wrestler from Mexico who could do it once.

The trick is to not look in his eyes. Unfortunately, as soon as you do, you are under his power and it's useless, you just have to do what he tells you."

"The great thing with working in the financial markets is you can do pretty much what you want.

Most journalists haven't a clue which questions to ask, and if they DO ask the right questions they quickly get a job paying ten times more with the financial institution they questioned.

The same goes with the regulators, who get paid peanuts.

Madoff is almost certainly taking the fall here, it is completely inconceivable that nobody else knew what was going on.

Now, oil me up some more biatch."

"It's like this group of guys go out hunting in the woods. They all go off alone and only one person shoots anything and then they all come back and nobody really knows who shot the thing. Well, they sort of know but who can tell anything for sure? This guy says he shot this thing but you didn't see him shoot it but you have a dead animal and he says he shot it so you assume he must be telling the truth because nobody else shot anything and you trust this guy enough to go shooting with so why would he lie?

The Madoff thing is like that but in really expensive suits."

"If you can't take the word of a 70 year-old ex-head of Nasdaq and once revered investment professional who can you trust? That's right, nobody, you're all doomed and it serves you all right and I've got all my canned goods in my cellar, enough for five years and do you know how difficult it was to get Best Before dates that long into the future? and I'm going to sit this one out in my hillside retreat. See ya, wouldn't want to be ya!"